NASA Hack Space: May 2018

The next cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station will be carrying among its supplies and experiments three cereal box-sized satellites that will be used to test and demonstrate the next generation of Earth-observing technology.

A small group of students recently got to experience a rare, spaceflight thrill: seeing if the tiny satellite, called a CubeSat, they designed and built not only survived a rocket launch to space but also successfully gathered and transmitted data once on orbit.

A team led by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory plans to include X-ray Navigation technology on a proposed CubeSat mission to the Moon. NASA engineers are now studying the possibly of adding the capability to future human-exploration spacecraft.

NASA and the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) have successfully demonstrated a new nuclear reactor power system that could enable long-duration crewed missions to the Moon, Mars and destinations beyond.

A new CubeSat mission -- GTOSat -- will not only provide key observations of the environmentally forbidding radiation belts that encircle Earth, it will provide initial steps of a new technological vision.